Little Falls transcript. [volume] (Little Falls, Morrison County, Minn.) 1876-1894, 1887-04-08
sTIsANCIsS AND DEATH.

I
Why People = ~ Ressss q Coase1o.s1sss s. the
s5as Grays. II 4.
From the New York Herald. fE 4. +. s.$ a
There is no excuse for any one be-
ing buried alive said Dr.. W a.
Hammond, A Herald reporter had
called On him ID reference to the burr.
al alive Of Miss stickney, Of Indian
Sapolis, who was taken out OF q vault
and foundzto be in q trance-state, and
did not die until several weeks after;
her funeral. j
p '"tNo," he continued, 'sthere is no ex-
cuse for It. The tests OF death have
been brought down to such q point
that any competent physician would
have no difficulty in accurately deter
mining whether or not death had tax
en- place." -. $%G
'Does decomposition always set in
after death?'' ~
'.Invariably, provided the body is
not frozen. OF course you can freeze
it and keep it for years before it will
decompose-iust as fish are kept
frozen for market. The salmon that
you eat now were caught last spring,
and have been kept frozen ever since.
They are just as good
"Do you imagine that there is any
foundation to tho belief Of many that
people are sometimes buried alive?'
"Oh, I have no doubt OF it. have
known OF it's being done, but it is not
by any means offrequent occurrence
not nearly so frequent as many peo-
pie imagine. The physiciani is entirely
to blame when it does occur. The
fact that bodies have been found turn
ed over in the cotfins lead people to
,, believe that they were buried alive.
But that's not so. Itishprobably the
work OF the gases coming from the
body. Pent up in a coffin they be-
come very powerful, and it is almost
singular that they do not move
bodies around more than they do"
'"Then you don't take any stock in
the stories of men who come to
life under the ground, Of their terrible
struggles to get free, and their horrible
death at laat?"
''That' all bosh Poe wrote ofgrave-
yards trembling with the struggles Of
the buried alive. That's all bosh, too.
When people are buried alive, as they
certainly have been, they never wake
up to knowit. When in trance state
their vitality must be so weak that
when they begin to regain conscious
ness and to attempt to breathe they
die o! sutfocatian Immediately and
never know that they came to life
again. Buried for dead, they practi-
cally are dead.
'"That's consoling, at any rate"
said the reporter, who was beginning
to feel little 'creepy" in the gloomy
room, that in his distorted magma
ton began to seem like the interior of
a tomb. The doctor did not look un-
like Father Time as he waved his
cimeter.
''This Miss Stickney was undoubt-
eddy in trance-state when she was
buried" continued DR.. Hammond.
"Were it not for the water around her
heart she might have regained con.
seriousness"
sis it possible to freeze human be-
ing up for any length OF time and then
restore consciousness"
'No; not with human being. It
Can be done with some ofthe lower or
der OF animals Frogs are the highest
grade to which it can be carried sue
cessfu]Iy."
"Why can't it be done to menu"
because, no matter how warm or
how cold the atmosphere is, the tenn
perature Of O. human being in good
: health is always 80 degrees in life. Re
duce that temperature to the freezing
point and it would kill the person.
Now, the temperature of 9 frog is al
ways the same as the surrounding
air. If the mercury goes up to no de-
grees the frogs temperature goes up
there, too, without doing him any
harm. In the same Way it will 20
down to zero and the frog will not
mind it. have frozen a frog solid in
a block of ice, aud after some time
/ thawed him out, and he would Jump
all around the room. A frog is very
hard to kill. You can take his heart
out and he willstill live. Cut his head
! of, tickle him on one side with a straw,
! and he will draw up the leg on thas
side and push the straw away"
Ills that purely mechanical action?"
mo; it's because frogs brains are
not all in his head; some of them are
in his spinal column. and it is the lat.
ter that directs his legs. For that
| matter, I believe the brains of a. hu-
man being are n ot all in the head either.
A girl plays the piano and carries on
q conversation at the same time. The
brains in her spine govern the action
OF her hands, and the brains in her
head allows her to TALK
sis it possible for men to go into
frances that could be mistaken for
| death?"
eyes; it is quite certain that appar4
emit cessation Of all the vital functions
may take place without the entire loss
of vitality, which would leave the Or
ganism in the condition of a. dead
body to be speedily disintegrated by
| the operation of chemical or
physical agencies. The state of syn
cope is at times SO complete that the
hearts action can not be perceived
; nor any respiratory movements be
! observed, all power ofmovement be-.
ing for the time abolished, and yet re-
! Covery has spontaneously taxed place,
which could scarcely be the case it all
vital action had been suspended. The
best authenticated case OF this kind
! is that Of Col. Townsend that occur
red in the early part of this century,
: and of which the world has aboutiost
F., sight. wi
at is described by DR.. George
! Cheyne, who was an eyewitness. He
says the Colonel possessed the re-
markable faculty of throwing himself
in a trance at pleasure. The heart